Likemind has come a long way since its inception and profile in the New York Times. With about 250 members in Vancouver, our “chapter” has become one of the most active, with a lively Facebook Group, Flickr page and Twitter feed [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Wednesday, August 12th, 2009
Categories: Events, Inspiration, Vancouver | 1 Comment »
Icograda has formally announced Design Week 2010 to be hosted by GDC in Vancouver with official event profile information on their website.
Posted by: Mark Busse on Monday, June 15th, 2009
Categories: Associations, Design, Events, News, Vancouver | No Comments »
Likemind is gaining momentum in Vancouver, with over 200 members on its Facebook Group. Events the each 3rd Friday of each month, with the next gathering on June 19th at Elysian Coffee‘s new location at 590 West Broadway, between Camb [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Thursday, June 11th, 2009
Categories: Associations, Events, Fun, Vancouver | No Comments »
After engaging our discovery process, which looks past assumptions and digs deeper into the real situation and goals, we determined that they required a site they could easily manage themselves for use not only as a marketing tool, but for recruitment and communications too. So we developed a project plan that included the creation of a CMS-driven site (in this case Drupal) with an aesthetic emphasis on simplicity, intuitive information access, and messaging that better told the story of the Chatwin brand to their unique audience.
Considering their audiences' needs and what it is that a multi-disciplinary engineering and planning firm does, it was also important to use the site to emphasize their work. We created a modern, clean portfolio system separated by their three main areas of expertise—civil, building, and environmental—with a gallery of rotating images and case studies of their highlighted projects.
Engineers do love to produce lots of words and data, so by our launch date, the site was populated with copious amounts of information and contiues to grow. Thankfully our well-considered information architecture and site structure, which included a powerful serach tool, multi-functional footer and intuitive navigation system, a user can access any of the content with two mouse clicks.
Our entire team deserves congratulations, Steve Mynett in particular, who worked very hard with our developers on this project to see it through to a successful launch. Now that it's complete, the Chatwin Engineering website appears simple to me, betraying all the work that went into it's design. I think most websites that use smart interaction design thinking to organize and present complicated concepts and content fall into this category. Engineers can be a picky bunch, but in this case were terrific to collaborate with and work for, and they are thrilled with the new online presence and interactive tools we created for them.
Check out the new Chatwin Engineering website and tell us what you think!
[post_title] => Chatwin Engineering Website Launches
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One great thing about what we do as brand and interactive designers is the variety of clients and projects we get to work on, each very different needs, goals, and audiences. One day it’s a brand and collateral aimed at investors or a [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
Categories: Articles | No Comments »
There’s an old saying about 15 minutes of fame—that “all publicity is good publicity, as long as they spell your name right.” Well maybe my appearance this week on ESPN’s Jim Rome is Burning was the closest thing t [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Saturday, May 23rd, 2009
Categories: Fun, News, Pop Culture, Vancouver, Video | 1 Comment »
This American Life - Live! Encore
Monday, May 11th
Ricmond SilverCity Riverport
More info
I've already got my tickets, see you there!
[post_title] => This American Life in Vancouver
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I am so excited, one of my favorite programs of all time is coming to Vancouver, well Richmond actually. For those that don’t know, This American Life hosted by Ira Glass, is a one hour radio program (and also 30 minute tv show) on NP [...]
Posted by: Alex Leynes on Thursday, May 7th, 2009
Categories: Events, Film, Inspiration, Uncategorized, We love | No Comments »
It’s certainly no secret that we’re huge fans of GDC, the national design association in Canada, and the various events they produce. So, I’d like to encourage any and all creative professionals that work within the commun [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Thursday, April 30th, 2009
Categories: Associations, Design, Events, Inspiration, Vancouver, We love | No Comments »
Designed by Vancouver-based Karacters DDB—in fact the entire brand and integrated marketing program has been developed and rolled out by DDB Canada, with their local partners Tribal DBB creating the website component—the logo is meant to represent "the inspiring play of light and water one experiences" when in the nearly all glass building surrounded by mountains and water, according to Karacter's Creative Director James Bateman.
While I understand that the design team wanted to avoid any literal references to the city, mountains, or even the building itself—which I think could have been done quite subtly actually—I found my initial reaction kind of mixed, feeling that the graphic language was rather busy and not entirely feeling the connection to the inspiration of nature. Either way, it's certainly a brave use of visual language to use dynamism in an attempt to capture and communicate the inspirational feeling of the location of the conference centre.
I've already heard various opinions being bandied about—some positive, saying they think it is a fresh expression of the Vancouver experience not seen previously. Others have been more critical, claiming it looks sloppy and already dated—my favourite being the comparison to a blood splatter pattern (which seems almost apros pos these days). But what I'd really like to know is what the public think—they are the target audience, not a bunch of design wonks.
Sometimes I think that some of us with designers' eyes get distracted by issues like complexity of a graphic (ie. a logo made with photographic elements) and the difficulty of its application when flat vector shapes are commonplace, rather than enjoying the clever underlying layers of meaning. I will say that struggling for words as I did trying to explain the identity might be OK. Doesn't that happen sometimes when we're awe-struck by nature's beauty, the very thing that inspired the logo in the first place? I'm just saying.
So? What do you think of the new Vancouver Convention Centre identity? We'd love to receive your thoughts as comments below.
PS - Readers of this blog seldom agree on all things design, but I think we can all agree that this was a huge project for the team at Karacters and we offer our congratulations on its launch and offer our best wishes of luck that it becomes an enormous success for them!
[post_title] => New Vancouver Convention Centre Identity
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Last night I visited the the brand new Vancouver Convention Centre for the first time. While there I took special notice of the convention centre’s new identity and its applications. At first I must admit the logo baffled me a bit as [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009
Categories: Branding, Design, Inspiration, Vancouver | 6 Comments »
It’s time again for Likemind Vancouver, this time on Friday, April 17th at the Starbucks at Nelson and Mainland. Come join this growing group of very cool people for a cup of coffee and some terrific conversation. Here are photos from [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Thursday, April 16th, 2009
Categories: Events, Fun, Inspiration, Vancouver, We love | No Comments »
Living in Vancouver where the architecture is a little plain I get excited when I see creative and brave architecture elsewhere in the world. That being said Vancouver is listed on this site of unusual architecture, unfortunately the exampl [...]
Posted by: Matt SamyciaWood on Monday, April 6th, 2009
Categories: Architecture | No Comments »
What is DOXA?
DOXA Documentary Film Festival is Western Canada’s largest documentary film festival hosted by The Documentary Media Society in Vancouver each May. DOXA is a non-profit, charitable society devoted to sharing inspiring, innovative, and thought-provoking documentary films from around the world. For example, on April 16th, DOXA is screening Recipes for Disaster, the hilarious and thought-provoking story of a young Anglo-Finnish family as they rid themselves of all oil-based products for a year in an effort to live environmentally sustainable lives.
DOXA's role in the community.
There are numerous worthy charities, but DOXA is specifically doing terrific work in the arts and culture sector, helping expose not only documentary films and filmmakers to the world, exposing important issues and encouraging dialogue, and exposing Vancouver to the world as a significant city with creativity, innovation and high quality storytelling through world-class documentaries.
Beyond showcasing terrific films, DOXA also works hard to get youth involved with two amazing programs, Connexions Youth Forum and Rated Y for Youth. Connexions gives young adults the opportunity to be mentored by seasoned filmmakers and then allows those participants to create their own short documentaries to be screened at the festival—an opportunity I would have died to have when I was their age. And Rated Y for Youth is a DOXA initiative showcasing documentaries suitable for youth aged 12-18 to promote intelligent dialogue and critical media literacy to a new generation, through non-fiction, media arts.
DOXA's plan for the future.
Doxa has made significant structure improvements to create a solid foundation and plan for the future of the festival. The festival is expanding, improving its programing, producing more screenings and events, and is producing two exciting youth initiatives this year—introducing young people to documentary films and directly to the filmmakers and film making process itself. Awesome!
Why would I care?
As a community of passionate, intelligent, "switched on" creative professionals, I image most of you have an appreciation for good filmmaking. And I hope you agree that it's easy to go see a Hollywood movie anytime, but never as enriching or thought-provoking as a compelling documentary. Documentaries are where the truth is told, where learning happens, where movements take flight, and where change happens. I believe you are like-minded in your view of the arts and its impact on culture, and understand the financial need created by this economic climate which includes provincial and federal financial cutbacks.
Please join me in supporting the DOXA Documentary Film Festival, which is meeting real, humble needs right here in our own community. We're proud of what has been accomplished and excited by what it can become with the right kind of support and people behind it. DOXA is a registered charity run by a dedicated group of volunteers. There are numerous ways you can help support the festival along with their youth programming.
Here are the ways you can help:
DOXA Documentary Film Festival Needs Our Help Graphic designers don’t often participate in documentary filmmaking, which is a shame. Just as our craft helps shape culture, documentaries are powerful storytelling vehicles, often reveal [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Wednesday, March 25th, 2009
Categories: Associations, Film, Inspiration, Vancouver, We love | 1 Comment »
Perhaps not surprising, their objectives and audience needs and behaviour seemed best addressed through the creation of a blog. Senior members of the Henriquez team already kept personal journals and they wanted to archive and share their inspirations, opinions, rants, sketches, and even articles written on design and architectural topics. Also functioning as a modern upgrade to the old fax blast newsletters they used to send out, the blog Archimemo was born.
The next challenge though, was how to tie their less formal, almost sketchbook-like articles, with their corporate website and portfolio. Through some careful analysis and planning, we created an editorial method of promoting certain posts from the text-based blog format to their Flash-based website via what we called "the tunnel" using RSS.
The project was a challenge with hiccups and pitfalls like any other, but in hindsight I think we did a good job of meeting their creative brief and hope you agree.
[post_title] => Henriquez Partners Architects Blog and Website Launched
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We really enjoy working with architects. The simple fact that we speak the same language of design and work in the creative field, often immersed in a similar processes makes it all the more appealing. Last year we were fortunate to be aske [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Friday, March 20th, 2009
Categories: Articles | No Comments »
Have you ever wanted to eat at a fancy restaurant but afraid to spend a huge chunk of your paycheck? Well, stop spending money on strippers! Just kidding… Dine Out Vancouver is back again. With over 180 restaurants, starting on Januar [...]
Posted by: Steph Co on Wednesday, January 7th, 2009
Categories: Events, Food, Fun, Vancouver | 3 Comments »
Likemind Vancouver is gaining momentum with over a dozen cool folks showing up for coffee. Here are photos from the event. The next event will be held on January 16th at Workspace in Gastown, Vancouver, so if you’re interested in star [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Wednesday, December 10th, 2008
Categories: Events, Vancouver | No Comments »
As mentioned previously, Richard and I are co-hosting Likemind Vancouver, which has recently gotten the attention of the New York Times. So, if you’re interested in 45 minutes of coffee and casual conversation with likeminded creative [...]
Posted by: Mark Busse on Friday, November 28th, 2008
Categories: Events, Inspiration, Vancouver | 2 Comments »
